It is often necessary and desirable to electrically connect one component to another component. For example, a multi-terminal component, such as a connector, is often electrically connected to a substrate, such as a printed circuit board, so that the contacts or terminals of the component are securely attached to contact pads formed on the substrate to provide an electrical connection therebetween. One preferred technique for securely attaching the component terminals to the contact pads is to use a solder material.
In the electronic equipment industry, an important necessity is the rapid and accurate assembly of leads, terminals and contacts with contact pads of printed circuit boards (PCB) and other substrates. For convenience of connecting such elements, it has previously been disclosed to facilitate the soldering of their connection by securing a solder slug or mass to one of the elements so that, when positioned in engagement with the other element and heated, the molten solder will cover the adjacent surfaces of both elements to form when cooled a solder joint providing both a mechanical coupling and an electrical connection between the elements.
One disadvantage of using solder masses is that the solder masses first have to be formed to have the proper dimensions and then the solder masses have to be coupled to solder-holding elements (e.g., solder clips) before the solder reflow operation is performed. In the case where the solder-holding elements are in the form of a series of claw-like structures formed as part of clips that are spaced along a carrier strip, the claw-like structures are first formed by bending portions of the clip and then one solder mass has to be disposed within one claw-like structure. This can be a time consuming task.
However, what is needed as an alternative method of holding a solder mass on a solder-bearing device such that the solder mass is securely held by the solder-bearing device; however, the method should be neither overly complex nor time consuming.